Former Holy Trinity pupil Michael McClatchey started up record label Moshi Moshi 10 years ago.

Since then it has been described as one of the finest Indie record labels in the country.

Born and raised in Southgate West, Michael's music career kicked off after he finished an economics degree at Portsmouth and moved to London where he started up the label as a hobby with friend Stephen Bass.

He said: "We both worked for major labels and did Moshi Moshi as hobby in our spare time. It's a reaction to what we were both doing for our day jobs. We wanted the opportunity to work with bands that we loved but didn't fit in with the agenda of our major label day-jobs."

Known for producing a unique array of sounds, Michael, 35, has been quoted on the net as saying the label's aim is to keep 'things true to the bands' vision and how they want to be presented, but also hopefully pushing them as far in their careers as possible'.

And Michael says Moshi Moshi's aims have changed very little since day one.

He explained: "It's very much a 'bedroom indie'. Up until two years ago it was still run from home. We have an office now but it's not much bigger than a bedroom! I'd like to think we do interesting pop music, although it might not seem immediately obvious there is a pop sensibility to most of what we do.

"For a label of our size we punch above our weight and we probably take more risks musically than most."

Although he would not like to admit it, Michael's label has been responsible for helping some of the UK's biggest artists make the mainstream, such as Bloc Party, The Rakes, Hot Chip and Brit winner, Kate Nash.

"It was a real pleasure working with all of them. Bloc party and Kate Nash we just put singles out so we only worked with them for a couple of months. With Hot Chip we did their first album so we were with them for a couple of years.

"They became good friends of ours over that time and we still see them regularly. I don't think we helped Kate achieve a Brit, I think Kate was always destined to do well, we just helped her get started.

"We have done a lot of one-off single releases. A lot of the time it's not through choice because if we could, we'd keep the artists and do albums with them. However sometimes we can't afford to pay the advances to sign them long-term so we offer to do their first single instead."

Moshi Moshi is set to celebrate 10 years with a series of events including a show at the Great Escape festival in Brighton in May and a compilation album called Moshi Singles: 2006-2008 which will be released on April 7.

Michael adds that there is still a great deal he would like to achieve with Moshi.

He said: "I'd like to think there's no limit to where we can go. I want us to be competing with the majors and having top 10 albums, but the music industry is going through a period of profound change at the moment and it's difficult to know what will happen in the next five years.

"We have a couple of bands I'm very excited about at the moment - Slow Club and the Wave Pictures, they're young and supremely talented. I'm a little in awe of them, I think they've got long successful careers ahead of them."

Crawley is where it all started for the music supremo and he admits the town has some bearing on his career. He explained:"Crawley certainly influenced my musical development. I was a huge Cure fan and when I was growing up there was good local scene. I had a cool older sister who turned me indie at an early age so Moshi is probably down to her more than anything else.

"I had very little musical ability, I had a guitar that sat in the corner of my room for a few years that's about it. I did A-levels at Holy Trinity. I was pretty nerdy at school, I guess I still am."

Visit www.moshimoshimusic.com to see what bands are signed up to the label. On May 16 Moshi will stage an event at Horatio on Brighton Pier including acts Mae Shi, The Wave Pictures and Slow Club as part of The Great Escape Festival.

For the best in local entertainment buy the Crawley Observer every Wednesday.